December 16, 2010

Before signing Recognition Agreement to allow immigrant investors more time for Phase 1, ESDC signed similar document with Gramercy, FCR's lender

Atlantic Yards Report

Documents released today by the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) indicate that the agency was willing to allow extended delay of the project's Phase 1 even as it signed Master Closing documents in December 2009.

An ESDC response (also embedded below) to the State Supreme Court's 11/9/10 order regarding the failure to study a 25-year buildout reveals that, while the Recognition Agreement the ESDC signed in October allowed potential immigrant investors development rights to part of the future Atlantic Yards site, a previous Recognition Agreement did something very similar.

In that case, additional time was allowed if Forest City Ratner defaulted on its obligation to Gramercy Warehouse Funding, which "holds a leasehold mortgage on certain Project parcels."

Neither the additional time nor the parcels were specified.

Phase 1 has an outside date of 12 years for a minimum amount of square footage, but the immigrant investors were given an additional seven years, for a potential 19-year outside date.

The new document suggests that Forest City Ratner, as it indicated to the Wall Street Journal, would at least in part use the $249 million no-interest loan from immigrant investors, via the EB-5 program, to replace higher-cost funding. The developer's land loan from Gramercy Capital was last reported to be $161.9 million.